Liferay Contributor Awards

At last year's West Coast Symposium, Liferay awarded Community Excellence Awards to several of our valued business partners. This award went to those partners whose employee's had the biggest impact on and contributions to on our open source community, regardless of how much business (i.e. money) was generated. Liferay enjoys a strong partner network, with over 115 global partners, and we wanted to show how much we appreciated their efforts in the community.

But there is another class of community member that deserves recognition: YOU!

Many of our Liferay Community members are affiliated with Liferay because they use it and love it, and aren't associated with any partner companies. It can be argued that contributions from this class of member is even more valuable, since they are done because of the love of the platform, the love of open source, or simply a desire to give a little back.

Regardless of our community member's reasons for participating and contributing, a great way to recognize individual achievements is with regular individual awards. To that end, we in the community are announcing a new program: Liferay Contributor Awards!

Liferay Contributor Awards

This award is given quarterly (every three months) to the top 3 community members who demonstrate the most unique and valued participation and contributions to our community during the time period. Everyone likes recognition of their achievements, and to that end, each set of quarterly winners will be featured on the community homepage, and we'll have a hall of fame board to remember your achievements, and be able to claim title to the throne for that period. Liferay has its roots in open source, is built with lots of blood, sweat, and tears from our community members, and these awards represent the best and most valued contributors we have.

Other Perks

As the winner of a quarterly Liferay Contributor Award, in addition to the recognition, you will also be entered into a random drawing for a prize! This quarterly prize will be one of:

A free seat at a Liferay Training of your choice within the next year (subject to availability, and not including travel or lodging or other costs -- just the training and associated materials).

A free conference pass to an upcoming Liferay Symposium of your choice within the next year (not including travel or lodging or other costs -- just the conference pass)

A $200 gift card to one of many choices of online stores

Since there are 3 quarterly winners, you will have a 1 in 3 chance of winning. Pretty good odds!

Do not think that you have to contribute to all of the above categories in order to win! Some members are great at answering forum questions, but don't fix bugs. Others have technical writing skills and could make valuable contributions to the documentation, but are afraid to stand up in front of audiences. Still others are awesome engineers and can diagnose bugs and implement improvements, but don't want to create plugins. We all have strengths, and it is generally where you can concentrate most of your effort (but don't be afraid to try something new, which can also be rewarding).

Nominations

In addition, community members are encouraged to nominate their members for the award. Did you get significant help from someone in the community on a ridiculously difficult task? Do you know of an unsung hero that should be recognized? Do you know of a community member who has demonstrated unique and significant value to the community, which may not be obvious to community staffers? Just drop us a note at community@liferay.com explaining why you think that a particular community member deserves the award. Nominations will be considered along with other activities that occur throughout the award period.

When do we start?

We've already started! The first quarter of 2012 is coming to a close in a few days. In early April, I will announce the first quarter's Liferay Contributor Award winners, and the drawing will be held at that time as well. You still have 72 hours to get your contributions in for this quarter, and be thinking about how you will dethrone the winners next quarter! Good luck to everyone!

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[...] I know I like to talk about our awesome community in general terms, but it's the individual accomplishments and contributions that make it so awesome. We are now recognizing individual achievements... [...] Read More